NAACP Rep: Stop And Frisk Just “Lazy Police Work”

Roland Martin talked with Dr. Niaz Kasravi of the NAACP about the big setback just dealt those who oppose New York City’s stop and frisk policy. As reported, a federal appeals court on Thursday blocked a judge’s ruling that found the New York Police Department’s stop-and-frisk policy was discriminatory. That court also took the unusual step of removing U.S. District Judge Shira A. Scheindlin from the case over interviews she gave during the trial.

“It’s absolutely a disappointment,” Kasravi stated. ” I think that Judge Scheindlin’s assessment of stop and frisk abuses in New York City were spot-on. I don’t think anybody can look at the numbers we saw with regard to how many people were being stopped every year — one year it was over 700,000 people, and most of them were people, most of them were innocent… that anyone can deny that her assessment was correct.”

The rest of Kasravi’s reaction to the ruling is in the clip below.

Kasravi also broke down the numbers behind stop and frisk and the disproportionate numbers of minorities being detained in New York. Refuting the notion that it keeps communities safer, she said, “It doesn’t result in anything. Less than two percent weapons-recovery, less than 10 percent [of those detained] even get arrested or issued a summons to show up somewhere, right? It’s basically lazy police work.”

Listen to the rest of the statistics she cited in the clip below.

Do you think Dr. Kasravi made good points about the stop and frisk ruling and statistics?